30 October 2014

I just wanted to post a quick update about my whereabouts and so. I'm currently on holiday in Germany, in Hamburg and Bremen to be precise. Here are a few photos from Hamburg, where the architecture is interesting and Brauhäuser are full of good beer and service.

I will post more about the holiday next week and also continue with new autumnal recipes.

28 October 2014

First veggie
Schnitzel post from me in October!? Well, better late than never.
Somehow I haven't made that many veggie burgers lately, maybe the
more autumnal recipes have taken over. But now I have been once again
experimenting in my kitchen for a different bean burger, and this
time my recipe is for red kidney bean Schnitzel with nice spices.
These Schnitzel are very versatile to use, and you can even freeze
some of them for later spontaneous usage.

I have made a few
veggie burgers before using semolina instead of my standard binding
ingredients wheat flour or breadcrumbs. I also find that these
burgers can be very easily veganised as the batter binds together
pretty well, meaning it probably would bind okay without the egg as
well. Maybe I'll try a vegan version next time.

Ingredients for about 10 Schnitzel

1 large onion

2 garlic cloves

1 tbsp vegetable
oil

480 g / 2 cans red
kidney beans

1 tsp smoked
paprika

1 tsp ground
coriander

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp sage

¼ tsp cayenne
pepper

½ tsp salt

½ tsp ground
black pepper
1 dl semolina + some extra for the surface

1 egg

Vegetable oil for
frying

Method

Chop the onion and
garlic finely and cook them in vegetable oil until soft.

Add the beans and
the seasoning and let cook for about 10 minutes. All excess liquid
should be evaporated during the cooking. Crush the beans a little bit
after the cooking and let the mix cool.

Add the egg and
semolina to the mix and stir it into an even firm dough.

Shape burgers from
the dough and roll them in some extra semolina.

I made mine oven
baked, but what I noticed then was that they became fairly dry. I
think this mixture works better when pan fried in vegetable oil.

But if you still
decide to go with the baking method, which is more effortless, here's
what to do: place the Schnitzel on a baking tray lined with baking
paper, and bake at 200 for about 30 minutes.

Enjoy as a
Schnitzel meal with salad and other sides or inside a burger bun. I
served mine with steamed purple sprouting broccoli and salad, a
little bit different combination this time.

I'm off to Germany
today, but I hope I have the opportunity to post something from
there. Certainly there will be a couple of Germany related posts once I'm
back. Have a great week!

27 October 2014

I was so excited
when I had the idea of making sun-dried tomato bread. Only later,
during the baking I realised that I have made a similar one before. I
posted it here and used a recipe from the Great British Chefs page. Today's bread however was a quick and spontaneous one and I didn't
consult that recipe before. Once again, this bread is baked with
spelt flour. As I have so many tomatoes, I decided to add one fresh
one as well, maybe to add just some colour.

Ingredients to make one loaf

1 tomato

4-6 sun-dried
tomatoes

1 tbsp dry yeast

150 ml lukewarm
water

6 dl spelt flour

1 tsp salt

2 tbsp olive oil

Poppy seeds for
the top

Method

Peel the fresh
tomato by dipping it to boiling water for a couple of seconds. Then
the peel comes off well. Crush the tomato to the lukewarm water.

Chop the sun-dried
tomatoes finely and add them to the water. Also add the dry yeast to
this mix. Leave them in the water for a couple of minutes while you
measure the other ingredients.

Mix the flour and
salt. Add the tomato and water mix and olive oil. Knead the dough and
let it rise for about one hour.

Shape a loaf of
the dough and place it to a bread tin. Let it rise for further 30
minutes.

26 October 2014

I thought a sweet
dessert would be a great thing to make for the weekend. I eat
desserts only rarely, but something homemade is usually quite good. I
got this recipe from Fazer (it's here in Finnish). I only made a little bit bigger amount than in the original recipe,
as I happened to have a 150 g baking chocolate and 150 ml double
cream. My version made two glasses full of mousse, which were a bit
too large portions. This is a very dense and filling mousse, so
basically this recipe makes four suitable sized small portions.

Marianne crush is
a Finnish product, and if you are not able to get it, there is an
easy way of substituting it in this dessert. Just crush some
peppermint sweets and a little of milk chocolate, and there you have
it.

25 October 2014

A while ago I
promised to post even this ad hoc recipe for a tomato tart. This is a
very quick dish and you don't need to have many ingredients at hand.
You can also substitute the tomatoes with courgettes, peppers, squash
etc. or combine all of these. This time I wanted to keep it simple
and only used tomatoes, which makes quite a good-looking tart. This
is a great dish to be served at a party as a savoury snack, and also
smaller tartlets can be made. Or if you get surprising weekend
guests, this is a perfect savoury dish to be made quickly. Also kids will like it as it's almost like a pizza.

Ingredients

200 g tomatoes

2 shallots

2 garlic cloves

3 tbsp olive oil

2 tsp Herbes de
Provence

Salt and ground
black pepper to taste

100 g emmental
cheese

1 egg for brushing

320 g shortcrust
pastry sheet

Method

I didn’t
pre-bake the pastry this time, and it was totally fine. A shortcrust
pastry doesn't get as easily a soggy bottom as a puff pastry.
Obviously this tart can also be made on puff pastry base, if you'd
prefer. In that case I would recommend pre-baking the pastry for a
few minutes without the filling.

Slice the
tomatoes, and chop the shallots and garlic. Cook the shallots and
garlic in olive oil soft. Season them with Herbes de Provence and
some salt and pepper to taste.

Grate the cheese
and add it to the slightly cooled shallot mix.

Roll the pastry
out and spread the mix onto it. Place the tomatoes on the top and
brush the tart edges with eggwash.

Bake the tart at
200C for about 20 minutes until the surface is baked golden brown.

23 October 2014

Gem squashes are
everywhere now and I just can't resist them because they are so cute.
Their flesh is a little bit similar to courgettes and the taste is
mild. Taste wise they might not be my absolute favourite squashes, as
I prefer something more nutty, but they are very good for a change.

I made again
stuffed gem squashes as their shape is really suitable for
good-looking stuffed squash halves (here's another stuffed gem squash recipe of mine). Pearled spelt based stuffing mix felt like the right choice for
these, and I made a really uncomplicated and easy version. Have a
look how I made them.

Ingredients

4 gem squashes

1 orange bell
pepper

1 shallot

2 garlic cloves

3 tomatoes

½ cup pearled
spelt

1 vegetable stock
cube

50 g cheddar and
mozzarella cheese mix grated

Olive oil

Salt, black pepper
and herbes de Provence to taste

Method

Chop the shallot
and garlic finely. Also chop the bell pepper and tomatoes.

Cook the shallot
and pepper soft in olive oil. Then add the garlic and the tomatoes.

After a while
simmering also add the pearled spelt, vegetable stock cube and ½ cup
water.

Let it all simmer
under lid until the spelt is cooked al dente. Then season and add the
grated cheese.

Cut the squashes
in half and remove the seeds. This leaves a suitable hole for our
stuffing.

Quickly fry the
squash halves in olive oil in a pan on each side. Stuff them with the
spelt and vegetable mix and bake at 180C for 30-40 minutes.

20 October 2014

The other day when
I was determined to make aloo gobi curry and had already started
cooking, I noticed that I hadn't bought naan bread. I find that naan
bread is the best side dish to aloo gobi. Then I remembered for
having recently read Felicity Cloake's Guardian article How to make the perfect naan bread,
and indeed that saved the day!

It turns out that
you don't necessarily need a tandoor to make naan bread. You can make
it on a dry very hot pan at home.

I followed the
recipe in the article pretty closely, only instead of 300g strong
white bread flour I used 150g wheat flour + 150g spelt flour. Were
these possibly the first spelt naans ever? Anyway, they turned out
very nice and went perfectly with my curry. There was even this
distinct naan taste – a success!

If you like making
curries, I would urge you to try making these naan breads as well. Do
any of you already have experiences of naan making?

19 October 2014

I love languages
and I have learned a few of them in my time, but I would still like
to learn so many more. I always liked all language lessons at school,
but German became quickly my favourite language. Already early on I
was determined to study in Germany one day, which I later did. I try
to list here the ridiculous amount of languages I have learned, but
please take into consideration that I'm only fluent in Finnish,
German and English. Swedish is kind of fine sometimes, it depends,
and French is regrettably poor at the moment... So here we go:
Finnish (+ Ostrobothnian dialect), English, German, Swedish, French,
Middle High German (Medieval German language), Latin and Irish
Gaelic. Quite a funny bunch, wouldn't you say so, plenty of dead and
half-dead languages. But the amount of speakers was never a
motivation for learning for me, I just happen to love grammar and
words. Anyway, long introduction to a simple thing: today I would
like to make my first multilingual post. Today's recipe is a classic
German dish, and I am writing it in English, German and Finnish. I
hope you enjoy the diversity in this post and find it at least a
little bit interesting.

My autumn trip to
Germany is approaching in a couple of weeks, and I already started
craving German food. It's not particularly easy to find veggie food
over there, but I have now transformed one of their absolute classic
meat dishes, curry sausage, into a vegetarian version. This has of
course been done before, and even a Currywurst ready meal is
available in well equipped German supermarkets, but this is simply my
version. And indeed it is fully my version as I have never even
tasted a Currywurst, as I was already a vegetarian when I went to
Germany for the first time. I didn't consult many recipes either
before making this, I just made a version of Currywurst how I imagine
it to be. I liked the end result very much, a spicy sauce, juicy
fried sausage and chips, but I still can't tell you if I got close to
the taste of the original. Maybe some of the readers have a better
idea?

Curry sausage with chips

I will start in
English as my blog is normally in English only. But even if you don't
know German or Finnish, have a little read below. The texts aren't
exact translations as I'm writing more from the heart and might not
mention everything in every language. However the recipe is of course
complete in all language versions.

This recipe makes
either 2 large or 4 small portions, and I served the Currywurst with
typical thin-cut chips.

Ingredients

500 g tomatoes

2 garlic cloves

1 tbsp olive oil

70 g double
concentrated tomato purée

½ tsp salt

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp smoked
paprika

¼ tsp cayenne
pepper

2 tsp medium curry
powder + some for sprinkling on the top

2 large baking
potatoes, vegetable oil and salt

6 vegetarian
Lincolnshire sausages + vegetable oil for frying

Method

Start with the
sauce by chopping the tomatoes and garlic. Cook the garlic in olive
oil for a few minutes before adding the tomatoes. Let the sauce
simmer for a couple of hours until the tomatoes have reached a nice
and intense taste. Purée the sauce with a hand mixer and add the
tomato purée and the seasoning and cook for a while longer.

Cut thin chips
from the potatoes, brush them with vegetable oil, sprinkle salt on
the top and bake in the oven until crispy.

Heat vegetable oil
in a frying pan and fry the sausages until they are nicely fried. Cut
the sausages into about 1cm long pieces.

Assemble the dish
by placing the sausage bits on a plate and pouring some of the curry
sauce on the top. Also sprinkle some extra curry powder onto the
sauce and place the chips on the plate. Now the dish is ready to be
enjoyed.

So, how did you
find this trilingual edition? Would you like to see more posts with
other language versions in the future? Maybe I could occasionally do
this for international classic dishes gone vegetarian (unless they
already are vegetarian).

17 October 2014

I haven't made a
normal risotto for a while, I've made more pearled spelt risottos
lately. Yesterday I however made a really autumnal risotto by using
queen squash as the main ingredient. Queen squash is a new
acquaintance for me this autumn and I instantly liked it very much. I
took a slightly different approach to how to add the squash to the
risotto, as this time I first roasted the squash cubes in the oven,
and then mashed half of them and stirred it into the rice. That
ensured quite a creamy risotto with an intense squash taste, a bit
sweet yet still savoury through the vegetable stock, sage and porcini
mushrooms. Perfect for this season I would say!

Here is my queen
squash risotto recipe.

Ingredients

1 queen squash

2 shallots

2 garlic cloves

1 l vegetable
stock

A few dried
porcini mushrooms

200 g arborio rice

Olive oil

1 dl white wine

20 g butter

Sage

Salt

Ground black
pepper

Method

Peel the squash,
remove the seeds and cut it into about 2x2cm pieces. Save the seeds
and toast them in the oven. They are really nice in salads, and can
also be sprinkled on top of the risotto for serving.

Roast the squash
cubes brushed with olive oil until they are soft. Mash one half of
them and set the other half to side.

Prepare the
vegetable stock and warm it up. Add the crushed porcini to the stock.

Chop the shallots
and garlic finely. Heat olive oil in a pan and cook the shallots and
garlic soft.

Add the butter to
the pan and once it has melted, the arborio rice.

Once the rice is
translucent after a few minutes, add the wine and let it absorb and
evaporate almost fully.

Add a couple of
ladles of the warm vegetable stock and let the risotto simmer under
the lid.

Stir often and
keep adding vegetable stock whenever needed. The risotto must not
cook dry.

Add the squash
mash to the risotto once the rice is almost cooked and simmer a while
together until the rice is al dente.

16 October 2014

Today's dish is a
very experimental vegetable bake. Originally I had the idea of
layering vegetables in a way like almost making a lasagne without the
pasta sheets. However when it came to the layering stage, I just put
the slices standing up on their sides instead. It kind of worked, but
maybe next time I will try that pastaless lasagne version as well.
This bake is full of veggies and only low on cheese, and I think it's
very suitable as a weekday meal. I added a pesto type rocket sauce on
the top to add more flavour to the bake.

Ingredients

2 aubergines

Olive oil for
roasting

3 courgettes

8 tomatoes

25 g mature
cheddar

Rocket sauce:

50 g fresh rocket

4 garlic cloves

4 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp salt

1/3 tsp ground
black pepper

Method

Try to select
vegetables that have approximately the same diameter as then the bake
looks more even in your oven dish. I didn't quite plan to make this
dish long enough, so my vegetables were a bit variable in size. Cut
the aubergines, courgettes and tomatoes into thin slices.

Soak the aubergine
slices in salted water for 30 minutes to remove the bitterness. Then
drain and roast them brushed with olive oil. They don't have to be
fully roasted, as they will return to the oven, but just a bit
softened and soaked in olive oil. I decided to pre-roast them in
order to avoid them being chewy.

Let the aubergine
slices cool a little, so that you are able to handle them. Then layer
the aubergines, courgettes and tomatoes next to each other into an
oven dish.

Make the rocket
sauce by puréeing the ingredients together into an even paste. Pour
the sauce on top of the vegetables and also sprinkle the grated
cheese on the top.

Bake at 180C for
about 40-50 minutes until all vegetables are nicely cooked. Done!

15 October 2014

Good morning!
Today I'm writing about a breakfast or lunch tip, which is always a
favourite of mine and easy to make. I like panini very much, and I
think that a tomato-mozzarella combination is one of the best for the
filling. That's why I chose those ingredients now as well and also
added pesto to the panini.

These are the
ingredients I used:

Panini bread

Tomatoes

Mozzarella

Basil pesto

Then all you need
to do is to slice the tomatoes and mozzarella, and possibly make the
pesto. Here is one basil pesto recipe of mine, but you can also use a
ready made pesto.

Cut the panini
bread in half and place the ingredients on it. Press the panini
halves together.

Grill the panini
on a dry grill pan on both sides until there are grilling marks and
the cheese is melting.

14 October 2014

Now it's really
getting autumnal here: heavy rain, severe weather warnings, wind!
Quite a few thunderstorms have also been here, which I like, but I
don't associate them with autumn. For a Finn they are a summer thing.
Finally I can fully enjoy walks in the park, wearing warm pullovers,
drinking tea and cooking autumn dishes.

Today's dish is
more a side dish, but you can eat it as a stand-alone dish as well.
In that case you might want to consider adding more vegetables and
spices to it. It's not really that autumnal, but there's more coming
up. I combined chickpeas with harissa and couscous in a very simple
dish.

Ingredients

1 cup dried
chickpeas

½ cup couscous

2 shallots

2 garlic cloves

250 g tomatoes

1 tbsp olive oil

3 tbsp harissa

Salt

Ground black
pepper

Pomegranate seeds

Method

Soak the chickpeas
overnight in water. Then boil them heavily for a few minutes and then
let boil more moderately for about one hour until they are cooked
soft.

Chop the shallots
and garlic finely and cook them in olive oil until soft. Chop the
tomatoes and add them and the chickpeas to the pan.

Prepare the
couscous by boiling ½ cup of water and then removing it from the
heat. Add the couscous and leave under lid for 10 minutes. Then add
the cooked couscous to the tomatoes and chickpeas and season with
harissa, salt and pepper.

Who is The VegHog?

A vegetarian hobby cook and urban gardener born in Finland, currently living in Denmark. I try to develop my cooking skills by making a wide variety of veggie dishes, some of them traditional and some new creations. My favourites include veggie burgers, squashes, organic and local produce, cider, spelt, rye, pizzas, pasta dishes, risottos and sea-buckthorn.
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